Interview: U.S. bill on Xinjiang interferes with China's internal affairs, says Russian scholar

Children have fun in "Dove Lane" in the old town Tuancheng of Hotan City, northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, May 27, 2020. (Xinhua/Sadat)

While China is effectively fighting terrorism and extremism, the United States is trying to smear these anti-terrorism and preventive measures as massive violations of human rights, Manoilo said.

MOSCOW, June 19 (Xinhua) -- The so-called "Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act of 2020" is an attempt by the United States to infringe on China's sovereignty and cannot be considered otherwise than an unacceptable interference in China's internal affairs, a Russian scholar said Friday.

"The United States sees China as its main geopolitical competitor and has long and consistently pursued a policy of containing China," Andrei Manoilo, a professor of political science at Moscow State University, said in an interview with Xinhua.

Washington is exhausting every means, from economic restrictions and sanctions to outright interference in China's internal affairs, like what it has done in the violent events in Hong Kong and Tibet, as well as the signing of the so-called act, Manoilo said.

Terrorist organizations operating in China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region have links with international terrorist network structures, and sometimes are branches or cells of international terrorist organizations, representing a serious threat to the national security, Manoilo said.

In recent years, he recalled, China has made considerable progress in preventing terrorist and extremist crimes and stabilizing the situation, with terrorist attacks in Xinjiang virtually ceasing.

"But this does not suit certain forces in the United States, which are trying to reheat ethnic and religious conflicts and destabilize the situation under the pretext of protecting the rights of the Uygur ethnic group," Manoilo said.

While China is effectively fighting terrorism and extremism, the United States is trying to smear these anti-terrorism and preventive measures as massive violations of human rights, he concluded.

On Thursday, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the Chinese government and people express strong indignation at and firm opposition to the signing of the so-called "Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act of 2020" by the United States.

This so-called act deliberately denigrated the human rights conditions in China's Xinjiang, viciously attacked the Chinese government's Xinjiang policy, blatantly violated international law and basic norms governing international relations, and grossly interfered in China's internal affairs, the ministry said.